Aeneas, at first doubtful about asking the Etruscans for help against the Latins, is given a go-ahead by his mother — tremendous crashes of thunder — and soon sets off for Agylla with Pallas, four hundred horsemen, and the pick of his own crew, the rest of whom he sends back to the Trojan camp downstream with a message to Ascanius informing him of what has happened.
At Agylla, Aeneas's company joins the Etruscans, who are under the leadership of Tarchon. Here, Venus appears before her son with the arms and armor that Vulcan has forged for him. The masterpiece of the ensemble is a magnificent shield decorated with episodes from Roman history, of which Aeneas, of course, can have no knowledge, since all of these events lie in the future. The shield's center depicts the crucial naval battle at Actium, which will mark the defeat of Antony and Cleopatra and the triumphant return to Rome of its future emperor and Virgil's patron, Augustus.
